Why aren’t Nigerian women bloodthirstier?

Nigerian women should be bloodthirstier

Last week, in an unprecedented display of ignorance, Cheta Nwanze posted a string of thoroughly disturbing tweets about feminism among modern Nigerian women, prompted by his interaction with one such young woman who insisted to him that she would never cook for her husband.

In his tirade, he espoused that women who refuse to cook for the men in their lives should have their sanity questioned, as though female children are born with “cook” stamped on their foreheads, and their destinies pre-programmed to end in the kitchen.

The hypocrisy of his statements lie in the fact that in Nigeria at least, women perform majority of all domestic work in addition to any profession they may pursue outside the home, while men do little if any at all.

The expectation from men like Cheta that Nigerian women should add cooking to the interminable list of tasks they have to juggle, is the height of laziness, and belies a profound and unwarranted sense of entitlement.

Even more incredulous is Cheta’s assertion that there is no genuine need for feminism today as opposed to in the past. That one is male, and therefore not the target of everyday misogyny is no excuse for this level of willful ignorance of the plight of Nigerian women with whom he undoubtedly interacts with every day.  

One need not look very far to encounter hideous examples of misogyny, patriarchal behaviour, and discrimination towards women in Nigeria.

Yet in spite of the unabated assault on the freedoms and rights of Nigerian women, Cheta declared feminism a hindrance to modern Nigerian women because it dawned on him that liberated women might have better things to do with their time than cater to the needs and wants of men like him.

This is precisely the sort of betrayal from self-proclaimed male allies that Nigerian women have come to expect.

Cheta should know better. It’s a tragedy he doesn’t.

In the midst of these benighted attitudes to women’s rights, you would think Nigerian women would be fed up of all the maltreatment they endure on a daily basis from men to the point of retaliation, but the reality in Nigeria demonstrates how much of a vice grip years of patriarchal indoctrination has on women in this country.

For a nation of people that believe deeply in miracles, our society is mostly blind to the biggest ongoing miracle in Nigeria: that though women suffer all manner of violence, primarily from male relatives, husbands, male strangers, and male colleagues, ranging from acid baths, to beatings, to rape, to sexual abuse, to forceful disinheritance, to being denied education and physical freedom, the level of female on male violence each year is relatively low.

Were women in Nigeria to suddenly rise up, and begin to display equal levels of abuse, violence, and aggression as they receive towards men, they would not only be well justified, it would be long overdue.

fed_up

This then begs the question: Why aren’t more Nigerian women murdering men? Considering that women in our country stoically endure an unrelenting onslaught of misogyny, gender-based violence, discrimination, and other undue ills purely for the crime of being born female, if modern history is anything to go by, so far, Nigerian women are a decidedly mild mannered lot.

The real miracle in Nigeria that nobody seems to be thankful for, is how and why women in our society haven’t collectively decided that enough is finally enough, and exacted bloody revenge.

revenge


Sugabelly is a Nigerian illustrator and blogger, she is the Features Editor at YNaija and also runs SugabellyRocks.com

Comments (7)

  1. Nice article Sugabelly. Look, Cheta, or whatever your name is. Cooking for one’s husband aside ( I don’t really care about that, that’s a personal affair); the fact that my male colleagues where I worked, expected me to cook and feed them, simply because I’m a woman (like seriously, no jokes) is adequate proof that feminism is very much needed. Thank you.

  2. The question here is…..Are we equal? It is because of these women we are where and what we are today…..and if they are fed up, let them leave this planet because we are here first…LOL.

  3. If fee you dat Nigerian men are not better husbands why not go marry your self.

  4. Well me athink if you are nor going to cook or respect me cuz feminism, well lets continue to fuck without marriage cuz feminism. Why complain about men not wanting marriage

  5. Fantastic. I will return.

  6. When they eventually decide to become murderers as you so stupidly wish, society will get to see who is more proficient at it.

    1. As far as we can tell, men commit majority of the murders worldwide, so we know who is the more violent sex.

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